I had an entire post written..........and a face book chat comment came up and ERASED my entire thing. ARGGGGGGGGthere's something weird about Firefox and Facebook on my computer.

Anyway......I'LL START OVER....

Dar has developed this very focused, very difficult to re-direct barking habit when someone is out in the street.

I'm not sure if there's just been such little foot traffic due to the weather, that he's forgotten what it's like to have people out, or what.

But his hair stands up..(not odd for him) and he runs from window to door and back, barking barking barking, at these people........and if I redirect him with the TREAT GAME, he'll do all kinds of stuff for me in the kitchen to GET the treats, but the minute the treats are gone, BACK he goes again, to the door and window, barking. (note the people are gone by this time)...

If I put him in the crate............he still barks. It's like his focus switch has been turned on and he can't turn it off....

When I remove him from the window and offer something to distract him (playing), he really just doesn't care.all he wants to do is go back to Incessant barking at the people in the street *that are gone now*...What do you guys suggest???

“Hope has two beautiful daughters: their names are Anger and Courage. Anger that things are the way they are. Courage to make them the way they ought to be.”----Augustine

amazincc wrote:Don't try to distract him... play the "what's that?" game with him.

I think Erin is back from vacation, and she can explain this WAY better than I can.

I'm not Erin (though secretly I want to be her), but yeah, "look at that", or "what's that", might help with this.

Basically, you click and treat the dog for looking at whatever is getting him going, ideally before he gets going. You want to try to click as soon as he first notices the person before he starts barking. If he looks back at the person after you give him the treat, click and treat again. The idea is that if you let him look at the person, rather than trying to keep him from looking, he can relax more. It also changes the person from something to get all upset about, to a way to earn treats. And eventually you can use the cue "what's that" or "look at that" to ask him to look at something exciting/scary and not bark. Erin and I have both used this with our fear aggressive/reactive dogs with huge success. I've actually added it to my basic obedience classes because I love it so much.

Sarah, would "look at that" work for guarding behavior? Oscar had an issue with that a while back and we did the opposite, teach an eye contact command and correct for breaking the eye contact command...but it's interesting to see another method, which obviously works.

I can only please one person per day. Today is not your day, tomorrow doesn't look good either.
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"You didn't know of the magical powers of the break stick? It's up there with genies and Harry Potter as far as magic levels go." SisMorphine 01/07/07

OK, I'm understanding the concept, but my question is - let's assume you see it (whatever it may be) before and start to play the game, he looks, gets treated a couple of times and then the barking demon takes over. Do you stop the 'look at that' and hope for better results next time, or do you try to calm the barking with the 'look at that'?

hugapitbull wrote: Do you stop the 'look at that' and hope for better results next time, or do you try to calm the barking with the 'look at that'?

I usually ignore the barking for a few seconds and then switch to some basics, like a "sit" or "down"... and treat for that.But only once the thing/person/dog we were looking at in the first place isn't there anymore. Most of the time it works.

Inara used to bark like crazy at the mail lady...EVERY day. EVERY day. And she's got a bark that can peel paint.

So with positive reinforcement (clicking for looking at the mail lady) and classic conditioning (mail lady = treats) we've got this problem under control. She'll still bark a little bit at other people, but it's decreased greatly.

Here's what I did/do:

I'm sitting at the table typing a message on PBT. I hear the mail lady truck coming down the street...or worse, I'm completely ignorant until Inara hears the mail lady truck coming down the street. In the beginning, she'd hear the truck, and run to the window and stare and start to bark. A lot. I could yell at her, lure her away with a treat or toy, or put her away...and the behavior would continue the next time.

Then I started LAT. I'm sitting at the table, she hears the truck and runs to the window and starts to bark. I calmly get up, go to the nearest treat container and get a handful of treats. I go to the window and look outside with her. I tell her to "Look at that mail lady!" Of course she's already looking, and I wait until she takes a breath, then I click/treat. I tell her to "Look at that crazy mail lady!" she looks and I c/t. I tell her "Look at that mail lady! She's bringing us MAIL!" and she looks, I c/t. I only c/t WHEN she's LOOKING at the mail lady, and when she's NOT barking. If she looks at me, or the treat, no c/t. We get about 10-20 c/t in while the mail lady does the mailboxes around our house. When the mail lady moves on, out of sight...the treats and clicker go away, and I sit back down at the computer and ignore Inara again.

The next day or so, we repeat the process...and this time, the looking at the mail lady becomes a bit shorter in duration, and the barking has subsided a bit.

The next day, when the mail lady truck comes down the street, I hop up excitedly and say "Mail lady's here!" I run to the treats, then run to the window. We both look outside as usual, and I c/t for Inara looking at the mail lady.

After a few days, the barking was almost gone...and she'd jump up in the window and then pointedly look back at me..."Ummm...aren't we playing the LAT game?!?" The stress brought on by the arrival of the mail lady was decreased...and it was now a FUN game.

To this day, almost a year later...we play only sporadically...maybe once a month or so...just enough to keep her interested. She'll still look out the window at the mail lady, but no barking. We will sometimes just run into the kitchen together for treats when we hear the truck.

The goal of the LAT game is to keep the dog from continuing to stress about something that they are reactive about. If the mail lady is causing the stress/anxiety/fear/excitement...then NOT looking at that (luring away with a treat, getting a time-out, getting eye contact instead)...doesn't make things better necessarily. As I tell my puppy class (we work on this with all of the puppies now)...I'm scared of clowns. They creep me out, and I'm uncomfortable with them. If one walked in the room while I was teaching puppy class, having me focus on something else (looking at someone's face)...isn't going to help me. I'm liable to be MORE scared...as now I won't know where the creepy clown has gone in the room...has it left the room?!?!? Is it right behind me?!?!?! I'd rather keep my eye on it...thanks very much. If Inara is scared of strangers (mail lady), then not letting her keep an eye on the person doesn't make her LESS scared of that person.

"I don't have any idea if my dogs respect me or not, but they're greedy and I have their stuff." -- Patty Ruzzo

"Dogs don't want to control people. They want to control their own lives." --John Bradshaw

Inara used to bark like crazy at the mail lady...EVERY day. EVERY day. And she's got a bark that can peel paint.

So with positive reinforcement (clicking for looking at the mail lady) and classic conditioning (mail lady = treats) we've got this problem under control. She'll still bark a little bit at other people, but it's decreased greatly.

Here's what I did/do:

I'm sitting at the table typing a message on PBT. I hear the mail lady truck coming down the street...or worse, I'm completely ignorant until Inara hears the mail lady truck coming down the street. In the beginning, she'd hear the truck, and run to the window and stare and start to bark. A lot. I could yell at her, lure her away with a treat or toy, or put her away...and the behavior would continue the next time.

Then I started LAT. I'm sitting at the table, she hears the truck and runs to the window and starts to bark. I calmly get up, go to the nearest treat container and get a handful of treats. I go to the window and look outside with her. I tell her to "Look at that mail lady!" Of course she's already looking, and I wait until she takes a breath, then I click/treat. I tell her to "Look at that crazy mail lady!" she looks and I c/t. I tell her "Look at that mail lady! She's bringing us MAIL!" and she looks, I c/t. I only c/t WHEN she's LOOKING at the mail lady, and when she's NOT barking. If she looks at me, or the treat, no c/t. We get about 10-20 c/t in while the mail lady does the mailboxes around our house. When the mail lady moves on, out of sight...the treats and clicker go away, and I sit back down at the computer and ignore Inara again.

The next day or so, we repeat the process...and this time, the looking at the mail lady becomes a bit shorter in duration, and the barking has subsided a bit.

The next day, when the mail lady truck comes down the street, I hop up excitedly and say "Mail lady's here!" I run to the treats, then run to the window. We both look outside as usual, and I c/t for Inara looking at the mail lady.

After a few days, the barking was almost gone...and she'd jump up in the window and then pointedly look back at me..."Ummm...aren't we playing the LAT game?!?" The stress brought on by the arrival of the mail lady was decreased...and it was now a FUN game.

To this day, almost a year later...we play only sporadically...maybe once a month or so...just enough to keep her interested. She'll still look out the window at the mail lady, but no barking. We will sometimes just run into the kitchen together for treats when we hear the truck.

The goal of the LAT game is to keep the dog from continuing to stress about something that they are reactive about. If the mail lady is causing the stress/anxiety/fear/excitement...then NOT looking at that (luring away with a treat, getting a time-out, getting eye contact instead)...doesn't make things better necessarily. As I tell my puppy class (we work on this with all of the puppies now)...I'm scared of clowns. They creep me out, and I'm uncomfortable with them. If one walked in the room while I was teaching puppy class, having me focus on something else (looking at someone's face)...isn't going to help me. I'm liable to be MORE scared...as now I won't know where the creepy clown has gone in the room...has it left the room?!?!? Is it right behind me?!?!?! I'd rather keep my eye on it...thanks very much. If Inara is scared of strangers (mail lady), then not letting her keep an eye on the person doesn't make her LESS scared of that person.

THIS made it all MAKE SENSE........

Guess I gotta buy me a clicker..........No way 'round it.....

“Hope has two beautiful daughters: their names are Anger and Courage. Anger that things are the way they are. Courage to make them the way they ought to be.”----Augustine

Excellent description Erin..now what do you do when the barking is not really predictable...Magic will sometimes (not always) bark at people walking by the house...always if they have a dog...I know I know...grab the clicker and the treats and run

oKay........but now I realized the rest of the problem.What if there' s barking, because he SAW OR HEARD something,(a car door shut or a car drive by) and then CONTINUES with this crazed circling the house and yipping, barking, etc....like RIGHT NOW.There is not one thing out there in that neighborhood, but I cannot get him to calm the fu***K down....

ARAGGG

“Hope has two beautiful daughters: their names are Anger and Courage. Anger that things are the way they are. Courage to make them the way they ought to be.”----Augustine